Neverwinter Guardian Fighter PVE Build

* This is a work-in-progress. Companion and Mounts sections need work or don't exist yet.

Astral's natural affinity for earning Astral Diamonds and Spell-plagued Mod 5 refinement earned her the ostentatious privilege of owning best-in-slot gear roughly around her eleventh month in existence. She's also a member of LGPG, an Xbox Guild with a Rank 20 Guild Hall being built, granting her access to strong teammates and [soon] maxed out guild boons. When making comparisons to Astral, it is advised to factor an appropriate level of scaling in stats for Power, Recovery and Defense. For anyone ambitious, it should be inspiring to note that Astral is a true free-to-play character.

There are many ways to build a Cleric, only three ways are here. Astral attempts to be second-to-none, but experimentation is prohibitively expensive in Neverwinter and Mod 9 isn't out yet — Astral is the result of what sharing there is in the Neverwinter community and her own unique risks. These are general templates made with intention to assist anyone not entirely sure about the Devoted Cleric class. There will inevitably be tweaks that can improve these builds or take advantage of imbalances in different Mods, but these are the foundations that Astral uses, and they are not strict — for example, there is no reason not to put a Lostmauth Set on a "PVE Buffer" build, swap some feats for more damage, and go play PVP.

Hover over gear, powers, and feats to see more information.

Managing Divinity

A great Cleric rarely enters or leaves a battle without Divinity stacks, and Astral is not without ambition. Every encounter has three modes, many stack on themselves, and all have three levels of intensity when Empowered — a lot to think about while dodging life-threatening attacks and keeping a diligent eye on ally health bars. Astral has worked various rotations into muscle memory, trained in the art of stacking Empowerment orbs while maintaining two or more stacks of Divinity, and is conscientious of not ending a battle when her Divinity is fully drained. Expended Divinity grants Empowerment, and a triple-stack Empowered Break the Spirit is the Cleric's most important encounter.

Positioning

Many passive buffs and spells have a 20-30' radius — which isn't much — and if Astral is wearing High Prophet or leans Righteous she will have less room for error in tough battles. Astral has to use intuition and strategy to decide where to position herself on the field, and conserves as much stamina as possible by running instead of dodging. Astral infrequently runs a dungeon or raid with a Paladin on her team, and never removes her High Prophet armor for PVE content, so her builds always prioritize stamina recovery.

Buffing & Debuffing

At the start of a boss fight, a moment or two after the cutscene ends, Astral starts off her rotation by casting Anointed Army, then jogs to a location roughly 30 Neverwinter-feet away from the boss and casts a Divine Glow that hits the boss and as many allies as possible. She follows this up by placing an Astral Shield near the Guardian Fighter in a place where they will be able to cast Into the Fray and hit as many teammates as possible with its radius (also 30'). She then expends Divinity in anticipation of hitting the boss with a fully empowered Break the Spirit and Lantern of Revelation, staying close enough to the boss that she can immediately slide inwards to deliver another Anointed Army for her teammates and renew her rotation.

For battles that can't be won in a single rotation, Astral will place Hallowed Ground down and immediately follow it with the usage of the Sigil of the Devoted, repeating this step every 60 seconds as her Artifact allows.

When there is no Guardian Fighter to gift with an Astral Shield, Astral has a few options. If she has the Bear Your Sins feat, she will cast Sunburst in Divinity mode to apply a damage-over-time effect to the boss and lower its damage resistance. She can also opt to use a single-stack Empowered Forgemaster's Flame for an additional damage buff for her allies, or use Bastion of Health to support weaker teammates fighting mobs. If she is a Divine Oracle, she would likely choose Prophecy of Doom for the additional damage resistance debuff it stacks on enemies.

Healing

Buffing and debuffing should solve all of a teams' problems, but occasionally allies will be wearing level 60 armor or simply make mistakes and require healing. Astral's main approach to healing is to put a brief delay on buffing to expend all her existing Divinity with Divine Glow on the damaged ally, followed by a fully-Empowered Divine Glow and, if possible, Anointed Army. For teams with more "squishy" players, Astral will occasionally resort to using Bastion of Health cast in Divinity for quick heals, and maybe even Empowered for clutch saves.

The Cleric should not be put in the position of reviving a teammate, but instead should stand nearby healing the teammate doing the reviving, casting Anointed Army if rocks are falling (like in Lostmauth), and preparing to deliver an Empowered heal to the fallen ally upon revival. If Astral has to be the one to revive, she'll often put an Astral Shield down and cast Anointed Army first to avoid being downed during the revive.